Cross-Cultural Learning

Teaching is an incredible experience and it allows the teacher to learn from other students. Fortunately, there is even a better way for you as a teacher to enrich your life with knowledge and culture, which is to teach abroad. Once you travel from your local classroom to another class in a completely different country, that is when your true adventure begins.
For Instance, if a teacher from a small town in the United States goes to South Korea to teach in another school, what will be his...

As students and travelers, we've all been there -- dreading the moment when class would end and we'd have to go back to our host family's house where nothing (absolutely nothing) was comforting or even familiar, spending hours on long-distance phone calls with our moms/dads/friends/boyfriends/girlfriends back home, crying because the internet disconnected us from our "normal" lives for even an hour, or even feeling that everything in our host country is amazing and that we never want to retu...

We all know that study abroad programs can be extremely rewarding, both for students and for faculty.
There is so much to be said for the distinctive quality of immersing oneself in the actual surroundings where an historic event took place, or to take part in a cultural celebration firsthand; the connection is deeper once we ourselves journey outside of the textbook (or tablet), and directly into the context.
It is important to remember, as we prepare to take on such a journey, that e...

I recently had the opportunity to review The SAGE Handbook of Intercultural Competence edited by Darla K. Deardorff. With 29 chapters, 542 pages, and 45 contributors, it isn't the kind of book you read once and pass along, and it isn't taken lightly either. It's the ultimate guide for fostering intercultural competence, the ability to communicate successfully with people from different cultures. More like a textbook, this significant piece of work thoroughly covers the most important reason for...